Porous NiCo_2O_4 nanowires supported on carbon cloth for flexible asymmetric supercapacitor with high energy density

Recently, binary metal oxides have been considerably researched for energy storage since it can provide higher electrical conductivity and electrochemical activity than single components. Besides, rational arrays structure design can effectively enhance the utilization of active material. In this article, we synthesis a porous NiCo_2O_4 nanowires arrays, which were intimate contact with flexible carbon cloth（CC）by a facile hydrothermal reaction and calcination treatment. The rational array structures of NiCo_2O_4 facilitate the diffusion of electrolyte and effectively increase the utilization of active material. The asobtained NiCo_2O_4@CC electrode exhibits a high capacitance of 1183 mF cm^（-2） and an outstanding capacitance retention of 90.4% after 3000 cycles. Furthermore, a flexible asymmetric supercapacitor（ASC）using NiCo_2O_4@CC as positive electrode and activated carbon cloth（ACC） as negative electrode was fabricated, which delivers a large capacitance of 750 mF cm^（-2）（12.5 F cm^（-3））, a high energy density of 0.24 mWh cm^（-2）（3.91 mWh cm^（-3））, as well as excellent cycle stability under different bending states.These remarkable results suggest that as-assembled NiCo_2O_4@CC//ACC ASC is a promising candidate in flexible energy storage applications.

Chemical Degradation of Amine-cured DGEBA Epoxy Resin in Supercritical 1-Propanol for Recycling Carbon Fiber from Composites

Chemical degradation of diglycidyl ether of bisphenol A（DGEBA） epoxy resin cured with an aliphatic amine in supercritical 1-propanol was investigated under different reaction temperature and time. The combination of GC-MS and LC-MS proved that the epoxy resin was decomposed to five main products including phenol, 4-isopropylphenol, 4-isopropenylphenol, bisphenol A, and 4,4’-（cyclopropane-1,1-diyl）diphenol. The 13C-NMR results verified the chemical structures of the degradation products. The change of the products′ yield with time was evaluated by an effective means of HPLC. In addition, the GPC analysis confirmed the formation of soluble low molecular weight clusters during the degradation reaction. A possible free-radical reaction mechanism was proposed for chemical depolymerization of the epoxy resin in supercritical 1-propanol. After the homolytic cleavage of the aromatic ether linkages, the resulting bisphenol A biradical either produced 4,4’-（cyclopropane-1,1-diyl）diphenol after intramolecular rearrangement or generated bisphenol A after capturing hydrogen from 1-propanol.

Heat-induced Internal Strain Relaxation and its Effect on the Microstructure of Polyacrylonitrile-based Carbon Fiber

The transformation of the internal strain and its effect on the microstructure of polyacrylonitrile-based carbon fiber during the high-temperature graphitization were investigated. The internal compressive strain within the carbon turbostratic structure was confirmed through a careful analysis by wide-angle X-ray diffraction and Raman spectroscopy. Heat-induced strain/stress relaxation along the fiber axis was observed and was found to have a profound effect on the structure of both the crystallites and microvoids. The results indicated that, the relaxation of residual strain changed the graphite layers from a wrinkled and distorted morphology to a straight and smooth one, and consequently led the crystallites to stack closely and orderly with increasing stack height. The strain relaxation also changed the morphology of crystallites and microvoids, resulting in an anisotropic growth for the latters.

Preheat Compression Molding for Polyetherketoneketone: Effect of Molecular Mobility

Polyetherketoneketone(PEKK)is a new evolving polymeric material,and is considered as another important member of the polyaryletherketone(PAEK)family in addition to polyetheretherketone(PEEK).Hot compression molding can be used to compact and consolidate the PEKK products,where the temperature and pressure play key roles to affect the molecular mobility,entanglement and crystallization,and thus the mechanical properties of PEKKs.In this study,a preheating treatment was introduced in the compression molding,and it is found that such preheating is very essential to avoid the formation of crystal FormⅡ,based on the increased chain entanglement.Molecular dynamics simulations revealed that the molecular mobility is always suppressed when a compression is applied.Therefore,by increasing the entanglement via the preheating and maintaining such entanglement in the consequent compression molding,strong and tough PEKK materials were obtained,with a negligible fraction of crystal FormⅡ.

Preparation of Au/Ag Multilayers via Layer-by-Layer Self-assembly in Spherical Polyelectrolyte Brushes and Their Catalytic Activity

Spherical polyelectrolyte brushes （SPBs） consisting of polystyrene （PS） core and poly（2-aminoethyl methacrylate hydrochloride） （PAEMH） shell were prepared by photo-emulsion polymerization. Au nanoparticles （Au-NPs） with controlled size and size distribution were synthesized in situ using SPBs as nanoreactors. Via layer-by-layer deposition technique on the surface of SPBs, nano-composite particles with Au/Ag-NPs bilayer and Au/Ag/Au-NPs trilayer were prepared. The structures of the as-prepared Au/Ag multilayer SPBs were characterized by UV-Vis spectroscopy, TEM, ICP-AES and DLS. The charge reversal of the nano-composite particles observed by zeta potential confirmed the success of layer-by-layer assembly. The Au/Ag-NPs bilayer nano-composite particles showed high catalytic efficiency with an apparent activation energy of about 41.2 kJ/mol in the reduction reaction of 4-nitrophenol to 4-aminophenol in the existence of sodium borohydride monitored. The catalytic activity ofAu/Ag-NPs multilayer SPBs close to that of Au-NPs SPBs and much higher than that of Ag-NPs SPBs reveals its potential applications in cost-effective catalysts with high-performance.